MOWERY: Can't help but wonder, worry about Avila's future with Detroit Tigers

DETROIT — A catcher’s mask sat in a chair near the entry to the Detroit Tigers’ clubhouse all last week.

No one came to retrieve it.

Hard to tell whose it was, since it didn’t appear to be labeled in Little League fashion, with a name handwritten in marker on a piece of masking tape, or anything of that sort.

It could have been the dusted-off mask that Victor Martinez would eventually put on after basically two calendar years of disuse, when the Tigers’ primary designated hitter started Friday’s road game in New York behind the plate.

It could’ve been Brayan Pena’s, as he missed much of the week — with the exception of one pinch-hit appearance — after injuring his toe in Tuesday’s game, leaving Bryan Holaday and Martinez to start the next three games.

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More than likely, though, it was probably the new mask ordered for Alex Avila — a heavier, more padded, more reinforced mask which the Tigers hope will help better protect his head from foul tips.

The mask they hope will shelter him from more blows that might produce more concussion-like symptoms.

Will it?

That answer is no more clear than the ownership of the mask in question.

Maybe it will. Maybe it won’t.

The answer is not something that’s written on the front, on a sliver of masking tape.

It’s something they have to try, though, given that Avila gets hit in the head so often.

And given Avila has now had concussion-like symptoms at least twice in an 11-month span.

The most recent incident — when he got clipped by a foul tip in Cleveland on Aug. 8 — followed the one last September, when he got knocked out after running into Prince Fielder’s elbow chasing a foul pop-up.

And those are hardly the only time in that span that Avila has taken a blow to the head.

“You’re always concerned about that. You’re concerned about it. We’re definitely changing the mask. We got masks that have a little more padding, and the bars are heavier. We’re hoping that will help,” manager Jim Leyland said last week.

“But I’m concerned about it, because I’ve been suspicious of this for a couple of years with Alex.”

Avila’s still struggling to come back from the latest incident, and the Tigers — even if there were not a new concussion protocol put in place by Major League Baseball just last season — would be cautious with it.

He was checked out after the initial blow on Aug. 8, then went to New York to join his teammates. He caught a full game on Aug. 10, then had to be scratched from the next day’s lineup when he experienced light-headedness and nausea. He worked his way through the battery of neurological and physical tests to get back to a point where he could finally go out for a rehab assignment on Thursday.

Avila met the Triple-A Toledo Mud Hens in Louisville, and started behind the plate against the Bats, but only got through three innings before coming out with more headaches. The plan was to wait until he was symptom-free — maybe as soon as Saturday — and insert him in the lineup at designated hitter.

The key will be when he can get behind the plate and catch a game, and not have headaches afterward.

There’s a possibility that may not be soon.

Just ask the Twins’ Justin Morneau, who missed 174 games over a two-year span, dealing with concussions. Or his teammate Wilkin Ramirez, who missed 71 games this season after a collision in the Comerica Park outfield in May.

Or Jahvid Best.

Or Sydney Crosby.

Or any of the growing numbers of football players — professional, collegiate and amateur — who’ve “had their bell rung.”

Avila’s certainly not the only catcher to be dealing with this. The Astros’ Carlos Corporan ans Max Stassi, the A’s John Jaso, the Rockies’ Yorvit Torrealba and the Twins’ Joe Mauer are all currently on the seven-day concussion DL. Marlins infielder Placido Polanco is the only non-catcher currently on the concussion list.

More to the point, whenever Avila comes back, the basic issue still remains: What happens when he gets hit the next time?

Oh, the new mask might help mitigate the effects of the blow, unlike his old mask — “light as a feather,” as Leyland termed it — which was designed to pop off easily on impact, with the intent of dissipating some of the inertia from the ball’s flight.

But it won’t stop Avila from getting hit.

That’s something that no one has ever figured out how to do.

“Really talked about it with coaches, and I’m worried about it. He gets hit so many times. I really don’t know how it happens. He gets hit more than any catcher I’ve ever seen — by far,” said Leyland, himself a former catcher, along with bench coach Gene Lamont, either of whom could identify easily if Avila was making some sort of technical error that caused the problem.

“I don’t know if it has anything to do with, to be honest with you, with pitcher’s stuff, or not. (Max) Scherzer, (Justin) Verlander throwing 98, 99 (mph), the ball moving so they don’t center it, and they’re just fouling it back all the time.

“I don’t know the answer. Kind of confused on it.”

Through the first five seasons of Avila’s career, the trend became so pronounced that his wife, Kristina, hardly blinked an eye when she got the news of his collision last September.

“When someone tells her, ‘Your husband got hit,’ she’s like ‘OK, well? Is he OK? That’s nothing new.’ Then obviously, when she heard how bad it was, concussion and all that stuff, she was concerned,” Avila said when he returned.

“Yeah, I got hit a few times, and stuff like that, but that’s just ... I mean, how many times have you asked me that question?” Avila continued. “A lot. It’s just part of the job.”

He admitted earlier this season that he’d gotten hit a ton in his one season of catching at Alabama, something that he was hoping would prepare him for life as a big-league catcher, “but nothing could prepare me for this.”

At one point, there was a bit of humor to the whole situation, a bit of amusement with how often Avila got nicked up in the line of duty.

He got asked questions about where the “ball magnet” was in his body.

He earned the moniker of “titanium catcher” as an homage to his toughness and resilience.

He was even able to laugh when teammates said he looked like the oldest 25-year-old in the world.

None of that is funny now.

None of it.

This is serious.

Not in a “When is the Tigers’ starting catcher going to be back?” kind of serious.

More like a “How is Alex Avila going to live the rest of his life if this keeps happening?” serious.

“Once it happened, obviously, all the concerns from the trainers and the doctors telling me what it could become, if I didn’t take care of it. And obviously, hearing stories from guys like Morneau, and talking to them over the last couple of years, and seeing what they’ve gone through — a few (Twins) guys have gone through those concussion symptoms and missed a lot of time. That’s something I didn’t want, especially in my position, knowing that I’m going to get hit in the head a few times,” Avila admitted last year, before the birth this spring of his daughter, upon whom — by every indication — he dotes.

“It’s something that, in my position, could cut my career short. Obviously, I had to think about not only myself and my career, but the quality of life after that, and making sure that I was right before I got back in there.”

And that was after the LAST time it happened.

This problem is real. And even when Avila comes back to the Tigers — whenever that may be — it’s not going away, as much as, for his sake, you wish it would.

As we’ve learned about concussions over the last few years of increased awareness, they never completely go away. Your brain never completely goes back to zero. The damage is cumulative.

Once you’ve had one, you’re susceptible to another.

Once you’ve had another, you’re susceptible to two or three more.

Once you’ve had those ... you’re never quite the same.

“I’d be lying if I say it hasn’t crossed my mind,” Avila told Fox Sports Detroit’s Dana Wakiji this week, of the concern about the cumulative effects, “but that’s why we have doctors to make sure that I’m going to be fine.”

There’s no reason to believe that Avila won’t be able to make it back to catching for the Tigers sometime in the next few weeks.

Having a capable backup in Pena, a capable third-string catcher in Holaday, and a competent emergency option in Martinez certainly mitigates the need for that process to be rushed.

Nor should it be.

Take it slow. Follow every single part of the process, every step in the concussion protocol. Cross every ‘T,’ dot every ‘i’. Then do it again, just for good measure.

By no means is any of this an attempt to impugn the toughness of Alex Avila. He’s one of the toughest human beings I’ve ever met.

Nor is it meant to wish ill upon him. I hope that he never gets hit again.

I just know the chances of that hope being fulfilled are next to nil.

If you’re gonna get hit, you’re gonna get hit.

I also hope the new mask helps.

Or if it doesn’t, that he tries the hockey-style mask again. He said he’d tried it in spring training once before, but hated it, because it felt like it kept all of the impetus of the blow inside.

I hope that Avila has a long and injury-free career.

But once Avila picks up that mask again, and trots out to catch for the Tigers, everyone will be holding their collective breath.

Will it happen again? And when?

If it does, what then? How many more times before Avila says “No more,” and hangs the mask up for good?

Does he try to hang on in baseball, and attempt a position switch, like may soon be in Mauer’s future? Does he hit well enough to move to first, or third (his position early in college), or DH? Does he run well enough anymore?

Or does he just say, “Enough”?

I mean, he’s a bright young man, with a young family. He comes from a line of baseball lifers, from his grandfather, Ralph, the longtime Dodgers scout, to his father, Al, currently the assistant general manager of the Tigers. His godfather is Tommy Lasorda.

I’m sure Avila could get a letter of recommendation from one of those guys if he wanted to scout, or coach, or work in an MLB front office.

Someday — maybe soon, maybe not for years — that’s going to look like a more attractive option, even for an intense competitor like Avila, than getting beat up on a daily basis, and risking your long-term health in the process.

Whenever that day comes, the day Avila drops his mask in a chair in the hallway of the clubhouse, and walks out through the doors, don’t be surprised.